Waking up after death is terrifying. The first thing that came to my mind is if I really died. I didn’t feel any pain, and I am still conscious, so I guess that means that there is something after death. As I look around, I see an enormous forest filled with darkened trees in the distance while the area around me is a similarly dark grassy plain. I turn my eyes upward to the sky, only to realise that it too was pitch black as if it was night. I’m getting a serious underworld vibe from the gloomy atmosphere, I mean, it’s either that or whoever runs this place is really into goth. It looks nothing like what the underworld would look like in the movies.

The only other thing I can see are multiple lines of lights stretching out into the distance. As I wonder why I ended up in this place, I realise something significant. I can’t feel my body. I know people don’t normally consciously feel it all the time, but even when I actively try touching my hands, I can’t sense anything. I look down to see what happened, but I realise another problem; I can’t turn my head. As I start to freak out thinking that maybe I’ve become paralysed, I remember that I could look around before, so why can’t I do it now?

After a few minutes of trying to figure it out, I realise that I didn’t have a body, similar to the lights in front of me. This means that they’re probably deceased souls too. The reason I could look around is that I’m an orb of soul stuff, so I can see in all directions at once. I can also move, but instead of a moving sensation it’s more of a rolling one, since I’m an orb y’know.

So this is it, the afterlife is a dark place possibly ruled by a goth being and now I’m a ball of soul waiting in line for something. I try to talk to the souls on either side of me, and after a few minutes of trying I figure out that I can send a part of my soul’s aura as a message, similar to people with a huge presence.

As I communicate with the soul in front of me, I find out that we’re currently in line to be judged. It seems that a message was given an hour ago, but as I wasn’t awake then I missed out on it. My sister did say that I was really bad at waking up… Apparently after we are judged we are given options to choose from. Depending on how we lived our life and our circumstances, we would get points with which we can spend on what we want next. Some of the options consist of reincarnating into different worlds, specific species to become, potential talent in various fields and even wishes custom wishes. Of course, some people were really evil and were locked up in hell which I guess is a sort of afterlife jail, except without a need to care about wellbeing because we’re dead the treatment is much worse.

After hearing that we’ll be judged on our past life, I hope that what I’ve done will be enough to pull me over. I mean, I don’t mind becoming human again, I just don’t want to become a bug or anything.

I start to ask the person in front about his life, but it seems that he doesn’t understand what I mean when I ask if he likes cats or dogs. Starting to feel like I’ve invaded his privacy, I back off. Sure I maybe be obsessively curious about things but I know when I’m being annoying.

After what seems like an eternity we reach the end of the line and I see a row of booths lined up next to each other taking in souls. The people in the booths seem to be talking to the souls, probably about their options. I guess this is what being judged is like after death, it’s strangely professional. I expected more of a ‘I’m humongous and powerful and scary’ grim reaper kind of judge but I guess not. Getting closer to the booths, I realise that what I had assumed to be people are in fact not people at all. They look more like strange combinations of creatures. Some of them have horns and tails and some of them are furry and have wings. In some way or other they’re all different to each other and I personally find that fascinating. In any case, they’ve successfully provoked my interest.

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I’m finally called to a booth, and the creature behind it is a beautiful blue lady with curling horns. As I float in front of her, she confidently speaks to me much like how I spoke to the soul when we were in line.

“Hello, can you understand me?”

“Yes.” I reply.

“Oh good, most of the souls that come here haven’t figured it out yet so I’m relieved that you can. My name is Minty, I assume you’ve heard the message. Have you considered what you want yet?”

It’s not surprising that some souls haven’t figured out how to talk yet since I’m willing to bet that most of the souls here aren’t human and probably aren’t intelligent.

“No, but I’m interested in a seeing a list if you have one?”

It’s always good to see all your options. I know that there have been times where there was a better option but I didn’t take it simply because I didn’t notice it.

Minty shows me multiple lists for options on seemingly infinite different transparent floating screens, options for race, birthplace, era for birth, world of birth and much more. There was even a list for how many windows the place I was born in has. I guess I was asking for too much of a list. As I was thinking about how I was going to deal with this mess, Misty calls out to me, interrupting my thought process.

“You have 15 life points to spend on your options, I personally recommend that you spend it on things such as talent and intelligence as the rest can be altered as you live your life.”

Yes, that does make sense, living conditions and material wealth can be changed as long as one tries but talent and intelligence is impossible to improve as far as I know.

“Is there a rating against which I can compare it to?”

“Yes, the average for everything is 100 but a score of 100 is not necessarily smart by human standards as races are ranked against each other as well. For example, the 100 intelligence for a fly wouldn’t even compare to a 10 for humans. You can increase your intelligence using points or increase your points by decreasing your intelligence.”

I see, that makes sense. I guess I’ll aim for the race with the most potential then and by default become super smart?

“Out of interest, what is the average amount of points a soul has?”

“The average amount is currently around 1.”

Woah, so that means that I can influence my options way above the average person, but I’m sure there are a lot of others who’ve gotten higher than that.

“By the way, who has the highest amount of points?”

“You do.”

“Hmm wow that is rea- wait WHAT?! How do I have the most points?”

“Well that’s because a lot of people are getting negative because they secretly lead evil lives. You’re one of the few who hasn’t done much bad and has helped out a lot too.”

“Oh…”

Well, I guess that’s that. Time to decide on my options.

“What’s the best race for a curious person?” I ask.

“Of course, it’s the curious cat. It can freely change its abilities and affect timelines, it’s basically omniscient. As well as this, it’s good at befriending races that are usually aggressive towards those not of its own race because the aura it gives off is completely harmless. This means that it can freely explore dangerous areas without a care.”

“That’s it! I wanna be a curious cat!” I exclaim excitedly.

As I say this, I feel like I’ve lost a bit of my dignity… I’m standing in front of Minty shouting my head off about wanting to be a cat. How ridiculous this must seem to her.

“Are you sure, you will have to spend all your points so everything else is randomised, and you won-“

“I’m sure! Make me a cat!” I proclaim.

As soon as I say this, I see Misty and everything around me fading into the darkness and I remember that I had cut her off at the very end. I feel rude so I start to apologize before I go, but by the time I start sending the message everything fades to black. As I lose consciousness again, a final thought flitters through my mind.

‘I didn’t get to ask for her number….’